This is a continuation of a story of Gold-legged Frog by Khamsing Srinawk which is a part of writing assignment in English class. The story should tell what happened after the father visited the district office and returned home.

Nak looked at the cloudless azure sky. The firmament looked like a paint pallette of lucious colors, strange and simply breathtaking. They had a kind of unusual ugly beauty. The stillness of the evening air brought him peace despite the worry he has been feeling all day since morning. He could still hear the cry of his injured child from inside him. Imagining his son suffering brought him greater pain than the throb he has already felt from running a few miles to the District Office barefoot. Through the cliché gradient of pink, orange and yellow in the sky, he knew it was already sunset.

Nak had just finished collecting the money from the District Office. The process of doing so involved filling through forms of endless questions and waiting in line to submit and receive the money… All that work took so much time that through each passing seconds, he felt himself getting more and more anxious.

He could not think of anything else rather than his dying son.

xxx

The run back home felt like forever. An endless distance.

Ignoring all the pain from his already aching body, Nak tried to maximize his speed to arrive home faster. He imagined his son, in fine fettle and healthful, smiling as if nothing happened, greeting him as he reached home; just like always, happy and cheerful. But the reality that he has to face is not as elevated as what he imagined. Read the rest of this entry →

This is a continuation of a story of A Drink of Water by Samuel Selvon which is a part of writing assignment in English class. The story should tell what happened in Manko’s life until the rain clouds appeared.

After a long walk back to his hut, Manko started hypothesizing of what would happen if this never-ending drought were to stay with no drop of rain for the people of Las Lomas.

After hours of thinking and sitting on his bed, he sought Rannie out and told her, “I’m leavin’. Me stayin’ won’t do ya’ll no good. Like we said the boy needs plenty learning which ain’t gon’ happen if we got no money.”

After a heartfelt goodbye, Manko left the next day – promising that once he returns, all will be well.

Manko arrived at the nearest city, 20 miles away from Las Lomas, called Mehira. He looked up at the tall buildings and the busy streets; trying to keep up with the city pace. Every inch of the land was covered with buildings and filled with tiny shops along little lanes; noise from nearby traffic jams, conversations going on around, advertisements, billboards, and sirens were all so new to Manko – very different from the tiny peaceful village of Las Lomas. Still, he held his head up high and was determined to make his family proud, keeping them in mind as he worked endlessly. Day by day, as he earned every single cent putting his back into it day and night, his spirit slowly comes back to life making him believe – for the very first time since this terror of dry surroundings sprung devastation and havoc upon Manko and his family – that maybe things were finally turning around. Still, even though things were going splendidly on Manko’s end, the question remains; will Las Lomas feel the rain pouring down any time soon? And if not, then when? Read the rest of this entry →

This is a continuation of a story of Gold-legged Frog by Khamsing Srinawk which is a part of writing assignment in English class. The story should tell what happened after the father visited the district office and returned home.

The walk seemed to last for an eternity, which was worsened by the agony he had to endure; his feet were swollen with blisters as he strode along the path, as hot as a carpet of lit coals, on this sweltering day. Turning his head to the left and right, his eyes could see nothing but enormous expanses of paddy pastures, interspersed by several sabang and payom trees.

As his feet touched the soils of the town, he was astonished by what he saw. There were many buildings clustered together, all of which seemed to touch the sky, and wagons without anything pulling them, which let out a thick smoke. But there was no time to revel in these sights, for his son’s death was imminent. Quickly, he Read the rest of this entry →

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This is a continuation of a story of Gold-legged Frog by Khamsing Srinawk which is a part of writing assignment in English class. The story should tell what happened after the father visited the district office and returned home.

Hours have passed, still walking on the rocky rough road. The burning ball on the broad blue sky tortured him, trying to stop whatever he was doing. His sweat was dripping like falling rain. He was walking wobbly toward the town followed by the village chief. He could feel his heart pounding out of his chest murderously. But he did not give up hope that he would make it in time.

Thud

“Am very sorry… I need to hurry,” he mumbled. He raised his black round eyes a few inches towards the man. The man wore a dark brown torn robe while holding a black dirty rock bowl on one of the hand. A monk. He lifted his palm and placed them on his chest and began walking wobbly once more. Not long after, he could feel a palm lightly stopped his shoulder.

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This is a continuation of a story of Gold-legged Frog by Khamsing Srinawk which is a part of writing assignment in English class. The story should tell what happened after the father visited the district office and returned home.

Nak hurried through the wet mud with a heavy heart. He was worried sick about his son. He was afraid that his son life is on the edge. His feet were full of blisters of scratches, covered with mud.

Nak, covered with sweat and mud, finally arrived at the yellowish-white, old district. It was crowded with sea of peoples. It was a chaos. Nak had trouble passing through the unfriendly crowd. Finally after struggling with the crowd, there he stood up, in front of the security desk, asking the guy where he could claim his 200 Baht. He stared back at Nak, and then viciously yelled him to get a queue number. Nak was terrified because he saw a mile length queue in front of him. He had no time left; he couldn’t spend another second of his son life. His son’s life was critical.

By the horrifying thought that he would be sent to the jail immediately if he didn’t claim the 200 baht to the village chief. He slowly Read the rest of this entry →

This is a continuation of a story of Gold-legged Frog by Khamsing Srinawk which is a part of writing assignment in English class. The story should tell what happened after the father visited the district office and returned home.

After a journey of minutes that felt like days, he sublimely arrived at the town center. From then on, he had to make his own way – through the maze that was the town – to the District Office. Just heartbeats away from his destination, he saw the ghastly horrid queue that was the line up. Hundreds of thousands of the village community were waiting to get 200 baht.

He reluctantly walked frigidly and with a face full of despair. Whispers of thought drifted across his mind, syndicating of how this situation of being caught between a rock and a hard place, would be resolved. Standing in line alongside him was an old man wearing a patched and stained garment. He saw the father’s expression and said, “It’s been a while since I saw that look on any man’s face.” The father replied, “Troubles in the home can do that to you.” Endurance of how long he has waited finally ended. To his shock, he learnt that the District Office was not forcibly telling citizens – of which had five children or more – to obligate themselves to make their way to receive the 200 baht. It was, stunningly, a charity the government provided to help villagers with a substantial number of offspring to get by in times of weatherly havoc. Stunned with this fountain of information, his face froze and his nerves were shot. All this time he could have been back home holding his dear boy’s hand and gently carrying him through this hard time. Instead, blistering feet festered whilst standing under the baking light.

This is a continuation of a story of A Drink of Water by Samuel Selvon which is a part of writing assignment in English class. The story should tell what happened in Manko’s life until the rain clouds appeared.

A month has passed since then. Through the aridity of Las Lomas, Manko had hoped that rain would come showering the parched earth, soaking it with heavy drops of rainwater – but none ever came.

Every day, Manko had to work his way to the river to collect water. Even the walk itself was a tiring and long one, but that’s the only thing he could do to keep his family, and himself, alive. His son Sunny has grown very thin, and his wife Rannie fell ill.

The pile of yams and a bucket of muddy water was all they could afford to eat, considering his harvest was a failure with no rain.

Manko sat beneath the shadow of the usual mango tree and smoke. The earth burnt like hot coals on the soles of his feet, but he ignored it anyway. He has adapted to the heat already. He watched his dying cattles and cows stroll around the baren field, trying to find something to eat in the gruesome desert.

“The cows and cattles die a lot. No food, no water… All will die soon,” Rannie had told him earlier in the day.

Amanda or ‘Manda’ is known to most for her enthusiasm and interest in physics, which is a rare occurrence for most girls shy away from said subject. This girl who was born in the year of 1995 who resides in the Cengkareng area, stated her hobbies include the following activities : programming, jogging, and drawing. One of her fears or phobia is of cockroaches, for she has no love for dirty vermin or pests. She is also an active member in Mensa, having joined just last year, and avidly contributes her own word puzzles to the Mensa puzzle newsletter.

For her first 10 years of formal education, Amanda had attended an international school located in South Jakarta, thus explaining her more western oriented ways and views from the western culture that the students were submerged with. As her previous school did not put much pressure on their students thus resulting in lots of free time, Amanda pursued other fields of study based on her interest. Other than exploring deeper into other branches of physics such as electronics and quantum physics,the girl who owns a Siberian husky as a pet, also teaches herself some Latin on her spare time.

Like a small group of teenagers today, Amanda is one who finds herself liking classical music other than the generic genres of music today. When asked to give an example of, she reiterated, ” Dance of the Mirlitons by Tchaikovsky” as one of the songs she listens to. While on the subject regarding favorite things, the 5′ 7″ student shared that she finds herself having a liking to Japanese cuisine; and as she specified in more detail she shrugged off a quick one worded answer, “sushi,”. Taking a step back into the past, Amanda was presented with the question of her favourite cartoon flick she had watched in her childhood. “Oh, there’s been some good ones over the years,” Amanda found herself reminiscing. But after our discussion on each and every one, she found herself choosing the Nickelodeon based cartoon Spongebob Squarepants as her favourite tv series of the past.

To want to be better acquainted with Amanda, in hopes to see more of her personality we came to the topic of favourite quotes. It is no surprise when she started to quote a phrase in latin, given her interest in studying the dead language. Her favourite quote is, “Sub Sole nihil novi est”, translated into english it becomes “There’s nothing new under the sun”. Given a little clarification, Amanda explains that the quote simply refers to the fact that “whatever you see, you shouldn’t be surprised because its probably been there for quite a long time,”.

Reaching the end of the interview, we were able to squeeze a few more questions in. In highlight of recent events, the election for the governor of Jakarta occurred in the early weeks of July, and while on the cusp of discussing politics Amanda claimed that her political view leaned more towards the conservative ideology. Given her tight schedule with only a few months to plan for her prospective future after high school, Amanda does not have time to think of relationships with the opposite gender. However she was tight-lipped when asked the penultimate question about what she looks for or in an ideal partnership; in which she disclosed that she preferred the scientist/soldier type. In continuation to her higher education studies Amanda aspires to attend HKUST or would fate allow it, the prestigious engineering university MIT to study either mechatronics or electrical engineering majors.

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A horse,yes,that’s the first wonderful thing I remember about my childhood.

When I was eight,I took a horse riding lesson and Dori was the first horse that I rode. He had this beautiful white coat and the idea of spending my beautiful Sunday morning with him was just exhilarating. His pair of glistening dark brown eyes took my attention, I was completely infatuated with his eyes.
He offered me a certain mystery. The promise of breathtaking adventure.
I remember how thrilling it was,the rising hysteria that was surging through my body when we were trying to catch the wind.
I felt the freedom and there was nothing that could stop me, not even the rain. My teacher told me to take a break until the rain stopped but I just couldn’t avoid the adventure that Dori offered me.

My mom was rather terrified,she was so scared that I would fall off my horse and break my legs. You know how they say ”Mother is always right.” ?

I was just 5 years old then. The clock’s hand showed that it was 9.30 p.m., bed time for me, mom used to say. Before I lied on my comfy cloud-like matress, I put on my worn-out old pyjamas, brushed my teeth clean and took a leak. My old room was warm, small, with no windows on the walls and when the door was closed, there was no way for any light from outside to intercept into my room. I might turned on my lamp, but it was too bright for me and I couldn’t sleep with it. So I turned the lights off, trying to sleep while swallowed in a void full of darkness. Blindness was what I’d experienced that night. I didn’t dare to close my eyes or even to move an inch. Read the rest of this entry →